WorldSpot.net firmware

An easy to use firmware based on openwrt made by worldspot.net.

Features

Easy installation: You just have to create the node in your worldspot account by giving it a name, its mac address, and the hotspot configuration. Then, flash the router, and plug it to the local area network.

Remote configuration: There is no configuration web page on the hotspot. All the configuration is made on worldspot.net dashboard.

Real time dashboard: The dashboard now interacts in real time with your hotspot. You can:

see what hotspot users are connected

log them in or out.

execute shell commands immediately.

force an immediate checkin to update the hotspot configuration.

display some status or hotspot logs

reboot the hotspot

Based on openwrt backfire: Compatible with a very large hardware base.

A private SSID: A WPA encrypted network that is connected to your private LAN. You can of course choose the SSID of both network as well as the private wifi passphrase.

Hotspot monitoring: Every 10 minutes, the hotspot contacts WorldSpot servers to fetch its configuration (checkin). If WorldSpot servers don't detect any checkin after a certain amount of time, an email is sent to warn you that there might be a problem with the hotspot.

Only the hotspot is managed. The hotspot router is to be connected to your existing local area network modem/router, through its internet/WAN port.

The hotspot LAN ports are connected to the public hotspot network, so you can connect additionnal wifi access points to these ports to extend the hotspot coverage.

Installation instructions

Please be patient and wait several minutes (at least 5 minutes) after flashing without unpowering your router. The flash and first boot can get quite some time according to your router model.

Once flashed, connect your router to your network which provides internet with the dhcp protocol. The router MUST be connected through its INTERNET (or WAN) port. It must NOT be connected through its LAN ports.

Register to WorldSpot.net

Validate your email

Create a hotspot. Give it a name. This is only a configuration that can be shared between multiple hotspots.

Refresh the page, you should then see your node with the last checkin time in green, meaning it has succesfuly contacted worldspot servers to fetch its configuration.

Your hotspot is now linked to your worldspot account

You should be able to connect to the hotspot public wifi, and start to test and tune your hotspot configuration.

Configuration

Once created, you can edit your hotspot node and setup some parameters in "Worldspot firmware/Node setup/Node List".

There is also an additional option in "Hotspots/Configure hotspot/Coova AP hotspots options", the syntax is described here. For example, you can allow people to visit some allowed domains by setting the option:

HS_UAMDOMAINS=yourdomain.com,yourdomain2.com

The hotspot configuration will be automatically updated after the next checkin. (which can be forced in the dashboard)

Dashboard

The dashboard allows you to interact in real time with your hotspot from anywhere on the internet. You must first connect to your router in order to authenticate. This operation can take some seconds depending on your router.

Once authenticated, you can for example list the connected users on your hotspot and connect ( or disconnect) them in real time. You can also force an immediate checkin by clicking on "update configuration"

Note: After a reboot, the dashboard is sometime unreachable during several minutes.

Latest firmware versions

If you can't find your device version, please look at the these versions.

The "full" version only work with devices that have 8mb flash or more. They include the openwrt web interface.

If your router doesn't have enough flash, use the "std" version.

http://worldspot.net/wsbeta/14.07-20160229-1/

This firmware web interface (full version) is now accessible from anywhere on the internet in the "Node Setup" page with the "Administration" button on the right of the node list. (Exclusive feature). The web interface has interesting features like "Real time graphs" or historical traffic "VnStat traffic monitor". For the root password, use the one that is displayed in your node's "edit" page.

In the full version, there is now a third network called private. This network is guaranteed to be inaccessible from the other networks, and is safe. However this network is by default not connected to any of the interfaces (wifi or ethernet). If you don't use the router's lan ports, you can reassign them to the private network. If you know how to configure your switch ports and vlans (for advanced users), you can add an additionnal interface to the switch to have both public network ports and private network ports. Note that the "WorldSpot private" wifi is not connected to the private network, but to the wan network. You can also reassign the private wifi interface to the private network.

Mesh wifi feature

There is a new exclusive "mesh" feature which allows you to easily create a mesh network and setup multiple worldspot firmware nodes as wifi repeaters easily.

Simply setup several nodes on the same wifi channel with the usual setup method. To enable mesh, launch the "wsMeshEnable" command on the dashboard or in ssh, on all nodes.

For each repeater, you also have to disable the hotspot controller on the repeater nodes by sending the "wsChilliDisable" command in the dashboard command line.

There should be only one controller per mesh network, preferably the one which is wired to the internet. All other nodes should be setup as repeaters.

Once configured (check mesh connectivity with the "batctl o" command), you should be able to disconnect the network from the repeater nodes. They should remain connected through the mesh.

To monitor the mesh, in the dashboard, you can use the "batctl o" command to list the mesh nodes and see the connectivity between other nodes.

You can disable mesh with "wsMeshDisable" and re-enable chilli with "wsChilliEnable".

Troubleshooting

If you don't see the checkin time after some minutes, there are some things you can try:

Please check that you get the internet from your LAN by connecting the ethernet cable of your hotspot router to your laptop (or PC) ethernet port. The DHCP service must work.

If OK, power off your hotspot router (pull the cord), connect back the ethernet cable to its INTERNET/WAN port (very important), then power on the hotspot router again.

After one or two minutes, check on the WordSpot account/WorldSpot Firmware/Node Setup if you see a checkin time.

If your DHCP server (in your LAN router) indicates the list of DHCP leases, please check that the hotspot router is on the list.
If it is in the list, check if the mac address is the one you configured and get its IP address and try to ping it.
If it answers, try to ssh to the router using putty. The login is "root" and the default password when not configured is "f8j4o9c7"

The LAN ports ip address are set to 10.150.1.1. If you set your computer ip address to 10.150.1.2 and connect it to the router through the LAN ports, you should be able to ping and ssh to 10.150.1.1

If still no checkin, something may have gone wrong during the flashing process, or the mac address is wrong. Please contact worldspot.net with your account login, your mac address and router model.